Abenobashi Mahou Shotengai (Abenobashi Magical Shopping District) is cute, charming, naughty, wacky, and surreal.
Sasshi returns from summer camp to find that his family has moved, and that they had left his trading cards and Gatchapon at the old place... which has already been levelled. On top of that, his girlfriend Arumi announces that her father has a snagged a position as a French Chef at a restaurant in Hokkaido, and that they will be leaving Osaka tout-de-suite.
Then things go haywire in a way that nobody could have predicted. Arumi's grandfather gets peeved at a cat, and in his overzealous effort to disturb the cat's peaceful rest manages to break a kitschy chamber pot in the shape of a pelican that only he knows the real significance of. Reality crumbles and Arumi and Sasshi are sent hurtling into a series of alternate universe adventures inspired by and rivalling those of a host of classic animated features and series.
A sebisu girl named Mune-Mune appears seemingly from nowhere to tittilate and torture Sasshi endlessly... but turns out to play a critical role in the story as well.
Opening and closing themes by Megumi Hayashibara are first rate. The opening and closing credit sequences are minor masterpieces themselves.
Series that recieve especially barbed parodying include Evangelion, Tenchi Muyo, Slayers, Pokemon, Dragonball Z, and Ranma. But nobody get's away entirely unscathed... even the Teletubbies make cameo appearances!
Gainax has succeeded in taking off from FLCL and ExcelSaga into new territory. Abenobashi Mahou Shotengai seamlessly (well, almost) weaves a wacked-out surreal parody of all preceding animation with a fascinating and engaging back-story. Don't even try to follow the plots of the alternate universe episodes, just let the visual stream wash over you. Animation quality is stupendous, of course.
Abenobashi Mahou Shotengai has been licensed for U.S. release in 2004, but is currently available in a Chinese released 2-DVD set including all 13 episodes. The subtitles are execrable, but manage to convey the quality of the dialog. It will be interesting to see how the U.S. distributor handles the complex Shinto references, and puns, and jokes which depend on the understanding of Kanji. It is going to be quite a challenge.
Note that the packaging for the Chinese release has no English title on it at all... I don't think they ever expected this one to make it over here!
A few pics, all copyright Gainax: [Abenobashi Mahou Shotengai]
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